The questions are beginning to swirl about Skype's future as a property of eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) I for one think it's high time for Meg Whitman and crew to put that lumbering ox on the butcher's block. The latest in a long painful series of failures and foibles for the once overpriced Skype VOIP system is eBay's recent scolding of some of it's members for placing Jajah telephony buttons within their item listings to effectively allow the member to member communications which Skype was at one time slated to accomplish. A report by Stuart Corner of itWire states that, "According to Jajah, eBay has informed some of its users that placing Jajah Buttons on offers within the eBay marketplace is not allowed." Apparently Jajah buttons violate a long standing eBay policy against links to live chat systems. Free communication among eBay members is discouraged. Jajah co-founder Daniel Mattes, said: "We will work on behalf of our users to ask eBay to reconsider." I'm afraid to say that if eBay frowns upon Google shirts at their eBay live event, they'll probably continue to stand in the way of Jajah buttons in their item listings also.
A recent Bloggingstocks post by Beth Gaston Moon points towards a brighter future for Skype based on the words of Meg Whitman. I suppose anything is possible but this blogger thinks that if eBay doesn't unload Skype and do it quickly, they will be stuck with the world's largest pink elephant ever. For now at least, someone with some communications savvy could take hold of Skype and still mold it into something with some mentionable growth potential. As eBay clings willfully to Skype, technology threatens to overtake Skype dead in it's tracks in the hands of a management team which is in need of circumspect evaluation. Some people might want you to think that Skype's revenue increase of 96% year over year is something to crow about but if you recall, for the last two years previous, Skype did about nothing for eBay's bottom line and a 96% increase of nothing isn't much.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-23-2007 @ 2:29PM
Bob said...
ebay... ooops Feebay is just too greedy! Crazy fees that never stop. My favorite auction site is
http://www.coinbay.biz.
No fees! Plus you don't even need a credit card to register! Buying or selling coins? Check them out!
10-24-2007 @ 10:45AM
Mozelle said...
Amazon.com --Overstock.com. Both good sites! I have done all my Christmas shopping on those sites. They have Free Shipping!
A few more sites like that and eBay is History, lol.
EBay makes negative headlines everyday, while these other companies make money for their stock-holders.
Ebay has a bad habit of shooting themselves in the foot every time Meg Whittman opens her dumb mouth!
A few years from now eBay will no longer be a leader in anything! Sad but true!
Buying Skype was proof this company has no idea where it is headed. It just buys companies, lol. eBays Auction core business is dropping like flies!
If I were Meg Whittman I would resign! What a sorry CEO....
10-24-2007 @ 10:52AM
61857 said...
Tuesday.23 October 2007
Ever try contacting EBAY for disaster sales transactions when you purchased something you thought and got something else instead? It's a hell of a nightmare trying to communicate with EBAY. Lots of fraudulent sellers, bogus deals. I bid on a brand new lap top with zero bidders time out 1 hour about 17 minutes left, no other bidder than myself 61857 and I got an email when bid time was over that the seller pulled it off from bidding and the funny thing was there were no other bidders for 3 days prior to my bid for the new lap top, with allege new printer, so forth. Lots of fraud with EBAY.
10-24-2007 @ 10:53AM
TOPCAT said...
Meg Whittman needs to put both of her feet in her mouth not on the FLOOR. White Ho! CEO give me a break, more like C -U- has been, wanna B, should have been, could have been, might have been, Wanna B ....bleached blonde idiot.
EBAY is a hoax at best. Constantly ripping buyers off and never resolving issues with bid items won and then the buyers get something else all together, especially jewelry. WHEW!
10-24-2007 @ 10:54AM
Mike said...
I like your call Gary. MySpace... Facebook anyone?
10-25-2007 @ 12:42AM
bebop said...
Feebay? Greedbay? Com'on. I thought it was Pirate-Bay. For sale: one green eyed, two toed, 10 legged, three headed mechanical singing monkey... croons & swivels hips just like Elvis - can be yours for $3.5 billion. Bid now: $_____.
10-27-2007 @ 6:20PM
Alex Esguerra said...
It's a pity as we are still staking it out with Ebay even today. I believe Skype was a mistake. Not only was it a wrong investment, it just got so many spammers on it and just a waste of time which help even created the bad publicity that Ebay has gotten.
We are still there even in a very small presence to show Ebay that we are allies but eveything is correct something has to be done and soon.
4-20-2008 @ 9:52AM
Alex said...
It would seem that the EBay hacker Vladuz can now hack Skype:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/oct/25/ebay.hacking